


Peter Nureyev has no gag reflex

by noodl_eboy



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Day Off, Dirty Talk, Fluff, I know the title might seem controversial but I swear there is no actual sexual content in this, I'm Serious, Okay maybe for some dirty talk purpouses too, Post Season 2, Unresolved Sexual Tension, art included, it's the anime beach episode no one asked for, the 'gag reflex' part is there mainly for comedic purpouses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-05
Updated: 2019-07-05
Packaged: 2020-06-11 09:24:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,703
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19533166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/noodl_eboy/pseuds/noodl_eboy
Summary: Turns out he doesn't have it. Don't @ me





	Peter Nureyev has no gag reflex

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to my dumbest idea yet. I'm very proud of it. Art by me but don't tell anybody. Thank you @Liberte_Egalite_Broadway for encouraging this, you are partly responsible (love ya)
> 
> Warnings:  
> It's just dumb. That's it. But if there are any warnings I should add, please let me know.

Peter Nureyev has no gag reflex.

Juno notices it first when they're out on some planet, where they stopped by for just a couple of hours to refill their food supply, refuel the ship, and to pretend like they're just a group of regular tourists. Jet was in charge of guarding the ship and was probably using the time he had to polish the Ruby 7s perfect surface again. Peter pointed out jokingly that Jet was going to scrub the paint right off the mask if he was going to wash it so frequently (and he said it in that light hearted tone of his which indicated that under many layers of friendlyness and genuine respect towards his thieving colleague, there was still some bitterness on the matter of ownership of the Ruby). Buddy and Vespa wondered off somewhere around the time they were passing a street full of small corner shops where they mainly sold antiques (Buddy had a hoarding problem when it came to anique jewelry and nightstand lamps), and that left Juno and Peter keeping an eye on Rita, who was getting more and more excited by every souvenir stand they passed, and would undoubtably get lost if she was left here to her own devices. She probably wouldn't even notice when Juno would stop responding to her non-stop chattering with his "mhm"-s.

The planets climate was pretty hot, much hotter than that on Mars. They were all dressed in classic "don't mind me I'm just a dumb tourist" outfits, which included shades (Rita somehow managed to find the most Extra ones, which were tinted yellow and had frames in shape of pineapples), loose pants (or a skirt in Junos case), and button up T-shirts with terrible, colorful and flowery patterns. Nureyev looked ridiculous like this, but that just made Junos heart melt and he found that he couldn't stop smiling. Not because he was laughing at Nureyev and his bedazzled flip-flops, which were a crime against fashion by the way, but because he realised this was the closest to domestic that he has ever seen the thief. Sure, this wasn't an outfit that Peter Nureyev would pick for a relaxing day abroad, it was still in some way a disguise, but there was no need for drawing forth any alias when they were just having a walk.

So they were chatting relatively freely, staying just a couple of steps behind Rita, who has picked up a couple of local snacks in flavors Juno would never think were possible to make something eatable with, and kitschy fake flower necklaces in different color for every crew member (she wasn't sure if Jet would prefer a lime green one or a teal one so she just bought both). Juno, not used to this much walking in this kind of weather, was starting to get a bit out of breath, so Peter offered to take a break and sit on a nearby bench with some ice cream. Rita has opened one bag of mysteriously flavoured crisps already when they were waiting for Peter to return, and offered some to Juno, but he managed to politely decline.

"More snacks for me" she shrugged and continued to explain a very complicated plot of a stream from this months Ritas Top Five.

Nureyev was back shortly, he bought the kind of double popsicle that you can break in two halves for himself and Juno. He admitted excitedly that he never had anyone to share a popsicle with, which was pretty adorable in Junos opinion.

What happened next was pretty dumb. Not to deprecate Ritas and Nureyevs intelect, which they obviously both had, being the best hacker on Mars and the slyest thief probably in the whole galaxy (sorry, Jet), but the whole situation was... it was dumb, okay? At least, well, Juno felt dumb because of it. And you'll see why.

"Oh dear, Rita, you really don't need to eat so fast, it's not like we're in a hurry. We'll wait for you if we finish the ice cream first, right Juno?"

Rita stopped devouring the snacks for a second. Her face was covered in snack crumps.

"Mistah Glass," She was still calling him by his old alias and Nureyev had stopped trying to correct her anymore, because he didn't mind that much. "Ya think THAT was fast?? Look how much I can fit in my mouth at ONCE!"

And she shoved a fistful of crisps in her mouth. Her competetive spirit must have rubbed off on Nureyev because he decided to one up her by shoving the popsicle in his own mouth. Juno was dumbstruck by this, and caught himself staring wide eyed at Nureyev, and his thoughts began to wonder in a dangerous direction. Nureyev somehow made even the motion of pulling the whole lenght of the popsicle out of his mouth look graceful, and Juno would probably faint from all the blood rushing through his brain if his train of thought wasn't broken by the sound of Rita choking on all the snacks she stuffed in her cheeks, which she was apparently not able to chew and swallow.

"The hell are you both doing?! Rita, spit the snacks out, you can't chew this much-- No, Rita, don't you shake your head at me, your face is turning blue you're literally going to suffocate, SPIT THE GODDAMN SNACKS OUT-"

And all that was embarassing, but the worst thing of all this was that Juno could not fucking stop thinking about the fact that...

Peter Nureyev has no gag reflex.

He acts all weird the rest of the day, he avoids looking at Peter during dinner, he doesn't speak of what happened except for telling Buddy that he had to babysit two fools today and one of them was almost killed by her snack addiction, and left Rita to explain herself and be reprimended once again, this time by Buddy. He tried not to think about it for the next few days, but it lingered in the back of his head.

Was it, like, trained? Or did he never have a gag reflex all together. He wasn't sure if he wanted to know but he couldn't help but wonder. And it's not like was thinking less of Nureyev for it, it wa honestly pretty impressive if anything, and what Nureyev decided to do on his space adventures before he met Juno was not Junos business, but he uh, he...

He was thinking about it too much. So he decided to forget about it.

But then one day Juno and Nureyev were chilling in a hotel room together after a heist, waiting for the crew to pick them up. Not even an hour passed since they finished the job and Nureyev was preparing for the next one already, reading some article on bee-keeping on his comms, which was supposedly research for creating his new alias. Juno was laying on his back on the bed next to him. He didn't bother taking off his boots and coat before hopping on the hotel sheets and was busy playing sudoku on his comms (the only game he was actually good at), but soon realised he couldn't focus so he just stared at the ceiling and sighed petulantly.

Nureyev gave him a side eye.  
"What is it, detective?"

"Not a detective anymore," Juno murmured half-heartedly, because he knew they both knew it, and he knew Nureyev wouldn't stop calling him that regardless.

"You're a detective at heart, Juno. Once a detective, always the detective, as they say."

"Do they, though..? Actually say that?"

"Hm, no, I made it up. But they may," He was trailing off already, still focused on that bee article. "Whoever the 'they' are."

Juno just hummed in response to that. He got lost in thought again and a couple of silent seconds later he murmured, more to the ceiling than to himself, and definitely more to himself than to Nureyev:  
"You have no gag reflex. Huh. How is that even..."

And that caught Nureyevs attention. He looked up from his comms, stared at Juno, who didn't realise yet he was thinking out loud, with an expression of someone who has been jabbed with a pin.

"J- Wh- Excuse me?"

"What?"

"What 'what'?"

"Uh. Did I say that out loud."

"Yes, darling," He put his comms away, "You tend to think out loud sometimes, I'm surprised you didn't know,"

"Ah, shit, sorry, Nureyev." Juno sat up. He felt like he needed to be sitting up for the apology to feel more genuine. "Sorry."

"Where did that even come from?"

"It- God, this is embarassing- I just, I noticed that you don't have it, the gag reflex I mean, a few days back, when we had a day off on Pheta 27-A..."

It took a second for Nureyev to get what Juno was talking about, and Juno watched his face go through a couple stages of confusion, then understanding, and then just laughter, the kind of laughter that can make your eyes water, the kind that makes you bend in half or hide your face in your hands, and is very contagious.

So they laughed together, sitting on the bed in the hotel room, and Juno honestly could not remember the last time he laughed so openly and genuinely with someone. He has never seen Peter like this, too. Nureyev fanned his face with his hand, looking up, careful not to smudge his makeup with the tears that were threatening to fall.

"I have to admit Juno, that was... unexpected," You could hear a smile in his voice, and it was heart warming. "I completely forgot about that."

"I didn't,"

"So I see." He leaned into Junos space a little more and grinned with those sharp teeth. "You just can't stop thinking about the _impossibly, crushingly_ attractive way I ate that popsicle, can you?"

"Oh yeah, poor me. I absolutely can't." Juno grinned right back, and let his fingers trail up the arm that Nureyev was leaning against on the bed. They were very obviously flirting, exaggerating everything to make it funnier, but it actually wasn't that far fetched if he was being honest with himself.

Nureyev purred sweetly, getting so close Juno could feel his breath on his ear and neck, and he shivered. A burning feeling growed in his chest, his mind was blank suddenly, filled only with his lovers voice and smell, good God was it all intoxicating. That fucking cologne was going to be the death of him...

Nureyev had no plan to stop with the talk.  
"Hmm, always a snoop, are we, Juno? So you do have a detective in you, dying to know all my dirtiest secrets... were you distracted today, during the mission? Am I that irresistable to you?"

Juno felt his sharpened, manicured nails go up his leg starting near his knee, then under his skirt and resting on his thigh, digging into his skin just barely, not enough to hurt but enough to know that it could hurt, if he were to squeeze any harder. Juno rested his own hand on Nureyevs neck, his thumb stroking the side of his jaw gently, and went in for a kiss. Nureyev started talking again, murmuring something scandalous, but wasn't able to finish his thought before their lips met. The kiss was deep, hungry, and they weren't sure when exactly the line between jokes and serious flirting was crossed, or rather blurred and impossible to distunguish anymore, but there was no time to care.

Nureyev broke the kiss and was about to be pulled into another, but he managed to continue where he left off, his voice a rough whisper.  
"I bet you want to test it, you must want to find out exactly how far down my throat can I--"

The door slung open, cutting Nureyev off mid sentence, and Buddy stormed into the small hotel room with Jet right behind her. Juno jumped away, startled, his ears burning and heart racing. Nureyev didn't move, only his expression changed from surprised to mildly annoyed for being interrupted. Buddy stared them down, also keeping her position, but Jet slowly backed out of the room - he didn't need to watch this.

"Seul Neel Ai and Juno Steel." Buddys tone made Juno want to follow Jet into the hallway, as far away from this boiling volcano of a woman as possible. Unfortunately she was blocking the way to the door.

"You have not been answering your comms. Everyone has been worried sick, because they thought you've been captured. Rita," And here she turned to Juno, who has shrunken into himself under her gaze, "Our dear Rita has been hyperventilating for the last half an hour, because she was worried you two have disappeared again, and, may I remind you, the last time that happened her boss came back after weeks, barely alive and missing an eye."

She let that sink in for a second. Nureyev fell back on the bed with a dramatic sigh, like a grumpy teenager who's fed up with his mother yelling.

"And in the meantime you're here, Ai, all over each other, not answering calls, during work hours!"

"To be exact, Buddy, we haven't even gotten to being 'all over each other' quite yet."

She huffs, and Juno swears he sees smoke puff out of her, like some cartoon bull being bugged by the torreador.  
"And you think that makes your situation any better? Oh no, no. From now on, you two are not allowed to go alone on two person missions. Jet or Vespa are going to be going with you."

Juno almost let out a pouty groan that would voice his protest, but he stopped himself at the last second. Peter stood up, and his posture and expression changed rapidly from smug and annoyed to just straight up puppy eyed. Damn, he really was good at this. If he wasn't the love of his life, Juno might have found it even a little creepy to watch him switch personas like that.

"Buddy, dear, you'll surely come to regret this decision. The two of us work great together, just take a look at our track record! And we did claim the big prize today, everything went swimmingly; Are you really going to ground us like children for something we didn't even do?"

She hesitated for just a milisecond, but it didn't go unnoticed.  
"You are not being 'grounded like children' for failing the mission, darling, you are being punished for an astounding lack of proffesionalism, losing contact with the base, making Vespa and Rita plan a rescue mission, and wasting valuable time in which we could have been escaping this planet."

Buddy turned on her heels and was about to march out of the room, but she looked back and added:  
"You may have charmed Steel, Seul, but it will not work on me. It's decided. Come now, there is no use in wasting any more time."

She left and shut the door just a little bit to forcefully behind her, accentuating her point, and leaving them behind. Nureyevs expression changed again to a sly smile when he looked at his partner.

"No need to worry, Juno. I'll talk her out of this, just give her a couple of days to cool down." He said in a hushed voice and winked.

So, Nureyev did have her wrapped around his finger even if she wasn't ready to admit it yet. Maybe Buddy had a soft spot for him, or maybe he was just that good. Either way, Nureyev apparently gets what he wants on this ship, which is... comforting? In a way. But also kind of worrying. Because Juno knows Peter Nureyev, and Peter Nureyev _wants_ a lot of things.

"...Okay, uh, let's go." He managed to choke out, and took Nureyevs hand, who helped him up. They checked out of the hotel to then join everyone back on the ship.

Juno did benefit from Nureyev getting what he wants, he thought. Most of the time the objects of their wanting overlayed, so he really shouldn't be worried, should he?

It's them against the big, mean world, after all.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for not closing the fic after reading the first sentence, and then reading to the end. Tell me if you liked it in the comments (you know I need 'em)! 
> 
> Also, you can visit me on Tumblr or Twitter or Instagram (rudzik_art or rudzik-art, depends on the site) to see more TPP fan art. You can say hi, it will stroke my ego.


End file.
